six incidents<\/a>\u00a0where relatives shared the same contaminated batch of foraged mushrooms.<\/p>\nOutbreak persists beyond normal season<\/p>\n
Experts say the scale and timing of the outbreak are highly unusual. Death cap mushrooms\u00a0typically peak\u00a0in winter, yet new cases have continued into late spring.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is definitely a much larger than usual outbreak. It is lasting longer and going much further into the year than we would have anticipated,\u201d Heather Hallen Adams, toxicology chair of the\u00a0North American Mycological Association, said in an\u00a0NBC News\u00a0report.<\/p>\n
In a typical year, California sees only a handful of amatoxin poisoning cases. This year\u2019s total has already exceeded that baseline many times over, with new cases still being reported.<\/p>\n
Researchers say recent rainfall may have contributed to unusually widespread mushroom growth, but the extended duration and intensity remain unexplained.<\/p>\n
Statewide spread and language barriers<\/p>\n
Cases have been reported from counties including Alameda, Santa Clara, San Francisco, Sonoma, and Monterey, among others, according to the\u00a0California Department of Public Health.<\/p>\n
Patients range from infants as young as 19 months to adults in their 80s. Officials also report that many affected individuals speak Spanish, Mandarin, Russian, Ukrainian, Mam and Mixteco, highlighting the role of multilingual outreach in prevention efforts.<\/p>\n
Health experts said some poisonings may stem from traditional foraging practices brought from other countries, where similar looking mushrooms may be edible.<\/p>\n
Death cap mushrooms,\u00a0introduced\u00a0to California in the 1930s, often grow near oak trees and can be difficult to distinguish from safe varieties, especially in early growth stages.<\/p>\n
Public health response and warnings<\/p>\n
The California Poison Control System and state health officials are coordinating outbreak tracking and response efforts. Surveillance has been complicated because clinicians are not always required to report amatoxin poisonings directly to the state, making case detection less systematic, NBC News\u00a0reported.<\/p>\n
Officials are relying heavily on poison control reports and are working to add amatoxin poisoning to the state\u2019s list of reportable conditions. Public health agencies have launched multilingual warnings, including radio ads, flyers, and PSAs in several languages, urging residents to avoid consuming wild mushrooms.<\/p>\n
Health officials\u00a0warn\u00a0that cooking, boiling, freezing or drying wild mushrooms does not neutralize toxins. Symptoms, which include nausea, stomach cramping, diarrhea, vomiting and confusion, can take 6 to 24 hours to appear and may rapidly progress to life-threatening liver failure, according to\u00a0health officials.<\/p>\n
California residents are urged to avoid all wild mushroom consumption, keep children and pets away from mushrooms in outdoor areas, and seek immediate medical care if ingestion is suspected, even before symptoms begin.<\/p>\n
Reporter Anthony Thompson can be reached at ajthompson@usatodayco.com, or on Twitter @athompsonUSAT<\/p>\n
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Deadly mushroom poisonings in California mark record US outbreak<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"California is dealing with what experts\u00a0describe\u00a0as the largest known outbreak of deadly mushroom poisonings in U.S. history, with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":319584,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,8,117374,133390,47676,75783,3938,266,47615],"class_list":["post-319583","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-confirmed-cases","tag-death-caps","tag-edible-mushrooms","tag-mushroom-poisonings","tag-napa-county","tag-northern-california","tag-poisonings"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319583","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=319583"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319583\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/319584"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=319583"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=319583"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=319583"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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